"Fiat money is backed by men with guns; Bitcoin is not. So why should this thing have any value?"--Uber statist economist Paul Krugman.

Sunday, March 1, 2009

Goldwater

Here is a great interview with the late Senator Barry Goldwater. It is from the late 1970's, date uncertain.

It is notable how timely the discussion is, three decades later.

Cantankerous, controversial, common-sensical, unafraid as ever, Goldwater lives up to his reputation.

As expected Goldwater makes some very un-PC comments, being he came from an era and a generation that was never so quick as people today to get their panties in a wad over someone being too blunt or too honest for those of too delicate sensibility.

He makes one odd comment about libertarians "using force" whereas conservatives would not. I think he must have been reflecting on something narrow or specific happening around that time and involving Karl Hess, a tax-resister and a sort-of radical libertarian. (I may have this wrong, so feel free to correct me or expound on this....I'm looking right at you, Steve). At any rate, as a general statement the comment is quite off-the-mark and just plain bizarre, at least in the context of today.

Goldwater deftly rebuts the garbage, which remains in full force today, that those who want limited government are heartless or selfish or indifferent to true suffering. This tripe is stock-in-trade of those with ulterior agendas far beyond feeding, clothing, and housing those truly in need, 'not mentally or physically capable of hacking it in this world', to paraphrase the Senator.

Goldwater speaks of the road to socialism, and yes he uses that word : SOCIALISM. (BOOO!!!)

The Senator excoriates phony liberals, in comparison to Jefferson as a true liberal. He cites these posers' inability or refusal to learn from history in their incessant crusade to forcibly march us all into the grandest collectivism yet inflicted on purportedly self-governing free people.

Jefferson, he said, was of open mind and ready to experiment, but would alter course and adjust his thinking when schemes didn't square with the constitution and with freedom.

I also loved his observation that "there are too many people in this world that say 'hooray for me and to hell with you'."

Great stuff. I wish the Senator was with us still today, lending his voice to our national dialogue.

Thankfully for the multimedia wonders of our modern age, in a sense he is.